Harry Wingo, Google (Cloud Computing and Government Special Presentation, 2009 Convention

Monique Morris, NAACP VP, Advocacy and Research (2009 Convention)

Lisa Zaina, USDA Rural Utilities Service (2009 Convention)

   The National Conference of Black Mayors holds its a national convention every year in order to provide annual training to its member mayors.  Today, NCBM represents more than 650 mayors who collectively serve more than 48 million people across the United States.  From the small rural township to the large urban metropolis and everything in between, NCBM Member Cities represent a diverse spectrum of municipalities.  But the basic needs relative to quality of life for their respective constituencies are the same:  education, health care, safety, broadband access, housing, roads, jobs, businesses, etc.   This year’s annual convention, “Able Leaders, Stable Cities: Resolving Our Communities’ Challenges,” will focus on models of best practices that can provide a clear blueprint to resolving the intersection of challenges facing mayors on the ground.  Your participation and support as a business/corporate sponsor for individual convention events, in-kind donations of services and products, or convention partnership is essential to the success of the convention.  Become a sponsor today.

Learn more about the sponsorship opportunities available

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CUT OFF DATE: April 24th, 2010

Rooms must be booked on or before the cut-off date to obtain the convention group rate. No group code necessary to book your reservations.

Visit the NCBM Dedicated Booking Website To Book Online

NCBM Past Presidents, 1974-2009 (2009 Convention)

George Fraser, FraserNet, Inc. (2009 Convention)

Michael Grant, National Banking Association, and Mayor Heather Hudson (2009 Convention)

  Dear Friends and Supporters:

 On behalf of the National Conference of Black Mayors, I invite you to join us for our 36^th Annual Convention, “Able Leaders, Stable Cities: Resolving Our Communities’ Challenges.”  The Honorable Mark Mallory and the City of Cincinnati, Ohio will host this year’s convention May 12-16, 2010.

 Across the country, communities of all sizes and diversities face the same challenges to varying degrees: unemployment, foreclosures, aging infrastructure, crime, eroding ecosystems, health disparities, embattled school systems, budget crunches, etc.  It will require the collective brilliance and innovation of leaders throughout various sectors to reverse the downward spiral in the quality of life of our communities indicated by these negative trends. I encourage you to complete your registration today for the NCBM 36^th Annual Convention.

 The National Conference of Black Mayors represents approximately 650 mayors across the country who serve municipalities ranging from small rural towns to large urban metropolitan epicenters. Collectively, NCBM membership represents more than 50 million citizens.  Our convention gathers the NCBM membership, along with other elected officials on various levels of government, to provide annual training and capacity-building solutions presented by leaders in both the public and private sector.

 As a registered participant of the convention, you will be able to attend all convention activities, sessions, luncheons and receptions. Please review the 2010 NCBM Annual Convention Registration Brochure for details on the convention agenda and events.

 The National Conference of Black Mayors looks forward to receiving you at this year’s annual convention and providing you with an enjoyable learning experience. If you have any questions or concerns, please feel free to contact the NCBM National Office at (404) 765-6444.  I hope to see you in Cincinnati!

DOWNLOAD NCBM 36th Annual Convention Registration Form

DOWNLOAD NCBM 36th Annual Convention International Registration Form

(Post Tribune/March 16, 2010)

The at-large member of the City Council said she is alarmed by her hometown’s high unemployment rate, crime, poverty and lack of investment.

“It is clear to me that people in Gary want a new kind of leadership and a new kind of government that acts with honesty and integrity to address the issues that plague our community,” Hatcher said.

But that government is also under increasing financial strain. The state’s new property tax caps are being gradually applied in Gary and forcing drastic budget cuts at City Hall. By 2012, when the next mayoral term begins, they are likely to be in full force.

“For the next few months, we’ll be not only looking at what’s currently going on in Gary, but also looking at ways that we can maybe take a fresh approach,” Hatcher said.

In making her highly anticipated announcement, Hatcher stopped short of committing to a run. However, she continued to follow in the footsteps of her father, former Mayor Richard Gordon Hatcher.

After serving as an at-large member of the City Council in the 1960s, Richard Gordon Hatcher was elected the first Black mayor of Gary and led the city for 20 years.

The former mayor looked on as his daughter filed her documents and spoke to reporters Tuesday. He said he sees at least one parallel between his run and his daughter’s potential campaign.

“If she’s successful and elected mayor, she would become the first woman to lead the city,” Richard Hatcher said.

Ragen Hatcher, a Democrat, is the attorney for the Gary School Board and is serving her first term on the City Council. She is the most high-profile person so far to express interest in running for mayor in the 2011 election.

Jack Lieske has also filed paperwork to form an exploratory committee and plans to run for mayor. Mayor Rudy Clay, who is serving his first full term in office, has said he plans to run again, also.

(GOVERNING/March 2010)

Cities are the largest emitters of ozone, the main ingredient in smog, and urban areas have been struggling to meet air quality standards while rural counties have generally remained below smog pollution limits. But under the new standard - which will set the allowable concentration of ground-level ozone between 60 parts per billion and 70 parts per billion - rural counties in Oregon, the Dakotas, Idaho, Nevada, Kansas, Minnesota and Iowa will suddenly find themselves forced to cut smog pollution for the first time. For many of these counties, which have very few cars and little industry, the pollution in their backyards isn’t even theirs - it’s being blown in from hundreds of miles away.

This challenge comes as many counties are facing budget shortfalls. When the George W. Bush administration set the current standard of 75 parts per billion in 2008, rural counties predicted that the limit would stunt economic development. “They worried the new standards would severely restrict their ability to attract new business,” says Julie Ufner, an associate legislative director for the National Association of Counties.

Though it’s too early to tell if those fears were warranted, the concerns haven’t changed in 2010. The EPA says the new standard could cost between $19 billion and $90 billion per year by 2020. Failure to follow through on a smog reduction plan, however, could be costlier. Counties that fail to comply face fines, the loss of federal highway funding and additional environmental requirements on new building or expansion projects. For most of these rural counties, already struggling to attract growth, any added burden on development could be crushing.

To understand how strict these new proposals are, consider this: Under the current standard, 322 counties of the 675 that monitor ozone levels are out of compliance. If the 70-parts-per-billion limit is adopted, 515 counties would be out of compliance, and only 15 counties would meet the 60-parts-per-billion standard.

The EPA plans to select a specific figure by August, and rural counties have until then to voice their concerns. The one demand they’ll surely insist be met? That regulations be set in place to force corrective agreements between the counties producing the smog, and the counties downwind of the smog. Otherwise, come August, counties and states will have up to 20 years to meet the new limits.

(NEW YORK TIMES/March 11, 2010)

But they were shocked this week when they learned that the woman, Juanita W. Goggins, had been a civil rights trailblazer who in 1974 became the first black woman elected to the South Carolina legislature.

Now residents of this normally neighborly Southern capital say they are feeling regretful, and slightly guilty, for allowing one of its most revered figures to disappear into a sleepy ranch house with little company. Possibly mentally ill, living without running water or heat, Ms. Goggins is believed to have died on Feb. 20 - when temperatures dropped below freezing - but her body was not discovered for 11 days.

Several neighbors in her elderly, mostly black community in downtown Columbia said they had learned the full scope of Ms. Goggins’s accomplishments only from her obituaries. At the peak of her political career, in the 1970s, she twice visited President Jimmy Carter at the White House and was the first black woman appointed to the United States Civil Rights Commission.

In the legislature, where she represented Rock Hill, on the northern border of the state, for three terms in the 1970s, Ms. Goggins, a Democrat, helped pass key legislation for improving elementary school education and public health. Last year, a stretch of Highway 5 was renamed in her honor. 

Read full text of New York Times article at www.nytimes.com by clicking here.

(USA TODAY/March 12, 2010)

States from New York to Hawaii that have been hard-hit by the economic downturn say they have either delayed refunds or are considering doing so because of budget shortfalls.

“It’s an indicator of how bad it is,” says Scott Pattison, executive director of the National Association of State Budget Officers. “You know things are bad when you have to do that.”

New York, hit with a $9 billion deficit, may delay $500 million in refunds to keep the state from running out of cash, says Gov. David Paterson.

Hawaii’s Department of Taxation says some residents may not see state income tax refunds until the end of August, The Honolulu Advertiser reported. It was part of a plan by Gov. Linda Lingle to deal with a revenue drop-off by pushing costs into the next fiscal period, which begins in July.

States often do not have a timetable for refunds because delays are based on cash flow. Most states typically issue refunds within 30 days.

Delaying refund checks isn’t unprecedented, Pattison said, but it is something virtually no politician wants to do, because taxpayers are owed the money and in most cases want it fast. Delays in paying refunds and other state bills can trigger interest on those overdue payments, depending on state laws, he said.

California’s massive budget shortfall of more than $20 billion last year prompted it not only to delay tax refunds but to issue billions of dollars in IOUs to vendors and others who were owed money. State Controller John Chiang called the delayed payments a “shameful chapter in the State’s history” when the IOUs ended last September.

California still faces budget problems, but Chiang said that revenue is running ahead of projections so far this year, lessening the threat of a repeat.

“Californians should expect to receive their hard-earned tax refunds on time,” Chiang said.

The delays come as some states continue to face deep budget holes, even as economists say the nation as a whole has begun recovery. In a recent report, the budget officers group and the National Governors Association said state fiscal conditions “have continued to worsen,” and that state revenues can be expected to lag one to three years behind a national recovery from recession.

This fiscal year, the report said, 36 states have cut nearly $56 billion in spending, and 30 states have cut funding to public and higher education.

One week after the 7.0 earthquake brought the capital city of Haiti to rubble, the Caribbean island is still enduring daily aftershocks throughout the country.  The intensity of the quake has shattered the already embattled infrastructure of not only Port-au-Prince, but also Grand Goave, Petionville, Delmas, Croix des Bouquets, Leogane, Carrefour and Cite Soleil, among other areas.

More than 50,000 Haitians have reportedly died, though on the ground this number is feared to be a very low estimate, with some projecting nearly one-third of the 9.7 million people that populated the country.  Food is scarce, clean potable water is even more.  Destruction to the airport and port has slowed the process of the badly needed aid resources and personnel entering the country; crumbled roads have hindered them from reaching the people in a timely manner.

With a police force dwindled from 4,000 to an estimated 1,500 and more than 4,000 prisoners rejoining the population after the National Penitentiary collapsed in the quake, looting, raping and killing is escalating. The resilient Haitian population struggles to survive in vulnerable tent cities while awaiting food, water, medical attention and other basic necessities to sustain them through this dark hour.

Priority items requested from our partners on the ground working with the Haitian mayors are:

Water

Blankets

Personal Hygiene Products (toothbrushes, toothpaste, deodorant, sanitary napkins, etc.)

First Aid Items (painkillers, bandages, gauze, antiseptic, alcohol, etc.)

Your donation of these items may be shipped to the following address:

The City of Homestead & Florida City Relief and Recovery Center

790 North Homestead Blvd.

Homestead, FL 33030

ATTN: NCBM Haitian Relief Effort

The Center may be reached via telephone at (305) 242-2400.   Please direct questions about the NCBM Haiti Relief Effort to haitirelief@ncbm.org.